Wednesday 24 December 2014

incarnate

incarnate
In the moments that pass
 it’s easy to forget that each and every second that slips into history found its trajectory in the beginning,
formed and foreseen on a grand scale,
such complexity is beyond the imaginings of everyday moments,
so far beyond comprehension and more immaculately formed than history could ever reason,
stars scratching pockets of light into night’s grey shadow,
fresh rains filled with static scent,
bird song heard at every moment
and from every destination more music spills out of creation,
life blood from open wounds,
in such moments eternity calls out in perpetual clang and clamour,
life upon life upon life and there is no letting go,
too far beyond imagination,
too heady to comprehend,
and through these moments each hour meets with love
and hopes dashed,
grief and birth,
death’s song stalks the same hospital wards as birth’s angelic cry,
this story erupts into the ether,
punctuating the mundane with the extremes of every form,
and into this day
 screams beckon forth
bloodied life,
formed in eternity,
ageless truth enacted,
personified with purpose,
to this diet of life and death the son comes,
fully formed of human flesh,
to be cursed and to be beckoned into life’s every complexity,
this life born of the same blood and filth of life
into the hovel of the homeless
speaks without words and without actions,
very presence of the presence in the present happenings of that time,
immanence and transcendence tested to breaking,
beyond quick words and carefully formed phrase,
the creator
born,
created,
bearing hope and hurt and nursing at the breast,
limitless potential
formed of fragile clay
born of pain,
born into pain,
born of dust
and destined never to return to dust,
in the everyday hours of memories forgotten to history,
this form will find resolve in a different destiny,
light overcoming dark,
forgiveness framing fear,
solemn is humanity’s cry,
pitiful and plaintive,
burdened and beaten,
world wearied and worried
by rumours spoken on TV screens,
swiped from left to right on tablet touch screens,
telling tales of worry and truth’s terror,
this is the moment and this shall be the sign,
into this broken truth,
this brutal reality,
ageless,
less than static yet unchanging,
into this
a birth beckons forth a new dawning
and a new opportunity,
a new understanding and a glimmer of hope,
the baby born to tension and threat,
born to bring release,
freedom and sight,
born to bring the disinherited home
and they are home,
in his arms,
engulfed by his perpetual embrace,
for the son born as baby lives beyond limits
and dies beyond imagination,
flesh and bone,
words and spit,
nails and loss,
rust and cost,
to this future he submits himself,
born in a stable,
laid in a trough,
born with blood and gritted groans,
clenched teeth and no home
but in a mother’s young arms and a father’s fervent gaze,
every breath-filled moment,
building on the last,
the kingdom comes,
built on rooted rocks and whispered dreams,
cradled in a manger,
the cornerstone soon to be discarded,
eternity’s song,
intimate and infinite,
nothing more and nothing less.



Thursday 4 December 2014

FERGUSON KADDISH

FERGUSON KADDISH
Holy, worthy, utterly magnificent;
We want to see your name held aloft,
Praised on tall mountains,
Exalted in cathedrals and at coffee tables,
Called out to the sky above us,
For you created it all.

Every moment is within your grasp,
Each leaf carries your DNA, encoded - it is all yours,
By your hand creation came to pass.

Arranger of stars,
It is your kingdom we long to see formed in our midst.

Before our days are at an end,
We dream of seeing your kingdom taking shape ever more fully.

But we are sick tooooo.

We are sick of lies, lies.

And we are sick of hate.

And contempt.

Injustice.

We are sick of this,
Life shaped by the sated,
Contemptible abuses that stain our streets,
Causing us to wonder just how much of your image there actually is in us.

Build your kingdom and build it fast,
The tracks of this train are straining and snagged.

We are headed nowhere beautiful and it is you that we need.

We will still sing in wild and endless praise of your name,
But our words are jagged,
Just as we, ourselves, are jagged,
Frayed at the edges,
Distortions,
Shadows of our calling,
Torn apart by mourning and injustice.

Speak a word to us,
You who is there in the vigil candle’s flickering flame,
You who is indelibly written on our arms,
You who stand kettled against the blockade,
You, who is deserving of shouted anthems of praise.

You.

You are our voice.

Just as we are yours.

On Missouri streets you are an echo,
A startling sound ringing out across ages,
Calling your people home,
Your voice,
Honed in the clamour of exilic forays,
Knows the razed burn of lament.
We are merely yet more witnesses to yet another defamation of your image;
Pure,
Boundless,
Squandered in chaos,
Wrestled into death,
Leviathan names another victim.

Credence given to Babylon’s tales and version of truth,
But you,
Shaper of seasons,
You are to be praised forever,
You whose breath gives life to clay and scatters dust,
And yet.

Ferguson.

Not just another anything, but,
A person,
A name,
Inhale,
Exhale,
Inhale,
Exhale,
And suddenly stop,
And stay stopped.

Michael Brown,
Not just a name,
Not just anyone.

Not.

Not a face without a name,
For every face bears a name to you.

And this name was and is and ever shall be,
Michael Brown.

Giver of life, as we forage amidst the ashes of this collapse of love,
Help us to understand.

We find no peaceable resolve,
harmony is crushed and broken.

And yet we call out.

For justice.

For change.

We sing with your cadences.

We sing,
And you hear.

We cry,
And you hear.

But Babylon stays silent.

The meta-modern motif creaks,
Those straining train tracks.

There is lack.

There is decay and fear and persistence,
In wilful abandon they find their muse.

Yet you,
Instigator of all things,
You remain.

Unchanging.

Unshaking.

You.

Known as much in your presence as you are in your absence.

Help us to hear you on the breeze,
To know you in burning branches,
And to trust you in the terrors of darkest night.

We long to sing praises to you,
But all we have is our lament,
Yet even in this,
We will gaze into imperceptible murk darkly,
Longing for a glimmer,
Quickly and without delay.

For the shadows gather,
And trouble rides with them.

So to you beyond our horizons and cradled within our cracked clay frames,
To you we sing our songs.

You are beyond all our words,
Anything we might see fit to mutter.

You are beyond.

And beyond is what we long for.

Beyond and yet immanent.

To you we cry out,
For you know our names and we each weigh heavy on your heart.

Ferguson.

Ferguson know justice.

Ferguson know peace.

America see with wide open eyes.

Fill time and space with words,
Some spoken,
Some silent,
Words of prayer.

And may peace flow like a river through dry temple courts,
And may a faithful rhythm be found for all people,
For those who wander - lost.

Those who march and sing prophetic acclamations.

And those who whose eyes are closed and whose hearts are hardened,

THAT THE NAME WOULD BE BLESSED.

AMEN.






(Written: 23:15 on 29/11/2014 - 01:21 on 30/11/2014)